Idaho semi-weekly world. [volume] (Idaho City, Idaho Territory) 1875-1908, 1887-03-15
A Battery In Action.

description OF the work ofa battery ~
sig guns:
Did you ever see battery take po-
sition?
1t hasn't the thrill Of q cavalry
charge. nor the grimness OF a line OF
bayonets moving slowly and deter.
minedly on; but there is peculiar ex.
citement about it that makes old
veterans rise in their saddles and
cheer.
We have been fighting at the edge OF
the woods. Every cartridge box has
been emptied once or more, and one.
fourth OF the brigade has melted
away In dead and wounded and miss
ING. Not a cheer is heard in the hole
brigade. We know that we are ing
driven foot by foot; and that when we
break once more the line will 20 to
pieces, and the enemy will pour
through the gap.
Here comes help!
Down the crowded highway gallops
battery, withdrawn from some 9th.
er position to save ours. The field
ience Is scattered while you could
count thirty and the guns rush tor
the hill behind us. Six horses to q
iece-three riders to each gun. Over
dry bitches where farmer would not
drive q wagon, through clumps of
bushes, over logs foot thick, every
horse on the gallop, every rider lash
Ing his team and yelling the sight be-
hind US making us forget the foe in
front. The guns jump two feet high
as the heavy wheels strike rock or log.
but not horse slackens his pace. not
cannoneer loses his seat. Six guns.
six caissons, sixty horses, eighty men,
race for the brow OF the hill as il he
who reached it first would be knight
ed.
A moment ago the battery was a
confused mob. We look again, and
the six guns are in position, the de-
tached horses hurrying away, the am
munltion chests open, and along our
line runs the command: "Give them
one more volley and fall back to sup.
port the guns" We have scarcely
obeyed when boom! boom! opens the
battery, and jets OF fire jump down
and scorch the green trees under which
we fought and despaired.
The shattered old brigade has a
chance to breathe for the first time in
three hours as we form O. line and lie
| down. What grim cool fellows those
cannoneers arel Every man is per-
feet machine. Bullets splash dust in
their faces, but they do not vince.
Bullets sing over md around; they do
not dodge. There goes one to the
earth, shot through the head as he
sponged his gun. That machinery
loses just one beat, misses just one
cog in the wheel. and then works
away again as before.
Every gun IS using short-fuse shell.
The ground shakes and trembles, the
roar shuts out all sounds from a
line three miles long, and the shells &c
shrieking into the swamp to cut trees
short off, to NOW great gaps in ths
bushes, to hunt out and shatter and
mangle men until their corpses car
not be recognized as human. Yot
would think tornado was bowling
through the forest, followed by pillows
of fire, and yet men live Through it
aye, press forward to capture the bat
terry. We can hear their shouts al
they form for the rush.
Now the shells are changed fo
grape and canister, and guns are free
SO fast that all reports blend int
one mighty roar. The shrek of ;
shell is the wickedest sound in war, Blu
nothing makes the flesh crawl Xix
the demoniacal singing, purring
whistling grape-shot. and the ser
pent-like hiss OF canister. Men,
legs and heads are torn from theil
bodies, and bodies cut in two. !
round shot or shell takes two mel
out OF the rank as it crashes through
Grape and canister NOV a swath ant
pile the dead on top of each other.
Through the smoke We see swarm
OF men. 1t is not q battle-line, but
mob of men desperate enough to bath
their bayonets in the fame OF tn
guns. The guns leap from the ground
ullllOSl, DIS llltS uiC nc itiCoottt oil III
foe, and shrieks and screams an
shouts blend into one awful an
steady cry. Twenty men out on TIL
battery are down, and the firing
interrupted. The foe accept it as
sign of wavering and come rushing or
They are not ten feet away when tn
guns give them a last shot. That dis
charge picks living men off their fee
and throws them into the swamp,
blackened, bloody mass
Up, now, as the enemy are anon
the guns! There is o silence OF tie
seconds, and then the flash and roa
OF more than 5000 muskets and
rush forward with bayonets. Fo
what? Neither on the right nor lei
, nor in front of us is % living foe
There are corpses around us whlc
have been struck by three, four an
even six bullets, and nowhere on thi
acre of ground is a wounded mar
The wheels of the gun can not NOV
until the blockade ofdead is removed
Men can not pass from calsson t
, gun without climbing over wlnroW
OF dead. Every gun and wheel
smeared with blood; every foot
grass has its horrible stain.
Historians write OF the glory
war. Burial parties saw murdt
where historians saw glory.
APIot to Kidaap Jay Gorid.
an,